THE week started on Monday, April 28, as a contingent of Fossils made their way to The Point at Polzeath to compete in the Spring Shield event arranged by the Cornish Seniors Golfing Association.

The course was a good as it gets and the weather glorious. The course which is a whisker under 6,000 yards long proved a challenge for all two-man teams in this better-ball competition especially early on with a stiff breeze blowing but which died back as the day wore progressed.

With all of the cards scrutinised, no less than eight teams beat par and four teams all came home with 38 points and requiring countback to separate their positions.

The teams placed one, two and four all came from St Mellion.

In first place and winners of the Shield, Brian Pound and Allan Evans, in second, Keith Abbott and Tony Hurley, and missing out on the podium in fourth were Colin Marshall and Mike Page. Only a pair from Falmouth prevented a clean sweep by St Mellion.

As by way of compensation, Mike Page won Nearest the Pin.

In the accompanying 2’s competition, Brian Pound, Mike Page and Brian Crichton won three-quarters of the pot.

The Fossils are now into an exceptionally busy period of inter-club matches and the Tuesday saw Lanhydrock entertained, but this time on the Kernow course.

Blessed with glorious weather and a great course, the result was always in doubt in seven very evenly-matched groups.

Surprisingly, Monday’s heroes from The Point managed the only halved match of the afternoon but which proved to be an indicator of the final result.

Initially the advantage fell to the hosts as the next two ties went their way, but the visitors struck back by winning the next three, so it all fell to the last group out to determine who would be victorious or not.

Keith Abbott and David Furse stepped up to the plate to secure a victory which converted the overall match result to be halved. Paul Osborne secured nearest the Pin for the Fossils as did Arthur Hooper for the visitors.

The Thursday competition was a 6-6-6 Individual Stableford and gave the Fossils a real conundrum of how to plan their strategy of playing six drives from each of the red, yellow and white tees and in which any order was permitted.

With strategies swirling, how did scoring work out?

Well in the case of the in-form Sophocles Ioannou, very well indeed.

Going out early on he amassed a staggering total of 44 points which together with his recent very good run of scoring will almost certainly attract attention of those responsible for handicap indices.

His total was four more than runner-up Terry Higgins who played in the group ahead of Sophocles and in third a further point back was Edward Waugh who went out in front of Higgins. It does seem that if a player has intentions to get a good score, an early start time has advantages!

Results: 1 Sophocles Ioannou – 44; 2 Terry Higgins – 40; 3 Edward Waugh – 39; 4 John Raphael – 38 (c/b); 5 Matt Braithwaite – 38.

One winter greensomes match was also played on the same day which saw Andy Bryan and Jim MacDonald beat Mike Page and Ted Ahier in a close encounter.